Page 32 - BPW-UK - E-news - Edition 124 - September 2024 - COMPLETED

Initially just 3 or 4 steps each time as
we went along the corridors to the next plat-
form for our journey. Then another flight of
stairs and then we stopped. It was definitely
not funny now. Olympic games volunteers
nearby told us to get the bus, as the next
stage by Metro wasn’t possible. Even that
meant carrying the scooter up a long flight of
stairs and we would all have to walk up, these
volunteers did actually help us by carrying the
scooter up for us thankfully.
Up on street level in Paris but still a
good half hour to walk to the Louvre, we decided to find a café for lunch; well you do have
to experience the culture too. We found a nice café with seats outside in the shade as it
was still over 30 degrees outside and made our choices and enjoyed the break before set-
ting off again for the Louvre on foot. We made it and had an amazing time wandering
around, even being allowed to bypass a broken lift by going through the room holding the
Crown jewels exhibit which wasn’t currently open to the public.

Then 3 of the party split off as they had tickets to watch some volleyball, only they
thought they would use the buses as they were supposed to be more wheelchair accessible.
The only problem there being there was a bike race on and several roads were closed, so
then the bus didn’t turn up and they missed the matches so ended up in another café.

The next day was another horseless day and 4 of us decided to go for a drive and
ended up in an out of town hypermarket doing food shopping. A nice relaxing day.
Saturday was dressage again and I was ferrying the 2 to the drop off area to do our
3 minute dash with the scooter again with my navigator along for the ride. Driving back to
the house we met a roadblock as there was another bike road race with all traffic diverted,
except we ended up going in circles and must have passed those same police 4 times, be-
fore we gave up, parked the car and decided to spend the time well by visiting the Palace of
Versailles that we had driven past each day. Google maps helped us get there on foot and
then we were in yet another queue waiting to enter. Wow, what a place, well worth the
money to visit. The gardens are spectacular too and have Musical fountains but we couldn’t
work out when they played so sat and waited for them and then walked to the next foun-
tains and waited for those to start. Three and a half hours
later we had seen most of the gardens and in any case it was
almost time to go and pick up the 2 from the Olympic Dres-
sage arena so we googled our way back to the car before the
phone battery died completely.

Sunday was the final Dressage session with Individual
medals being awarded so the 4 of us who had tickets made
our way to the disabled parking for the 5 minute walk to the
arena, why didn’t we know this on the first day? A great day
followed by a celebratory meal for us all and then to start
packing ready for an early start to Calais for Le Shuttle back
home.
Sarah Pomfret,
SEW (South East & Wales) Member